British Airways ... well actually the Union of Communists

markos1963

MattC59 wrote:

markos1963 wrote:

I would like to see a real figure not one printed in the Daily Mail

Don't you just love ill informed comments ?

And the Daily Mail is an unbiased and independant non Tory/capitalist supporting bastion of weel informed journalism?

nolf

Cleat Eastwood wrote:

1. We are along with other major economies technically out of recession. We are, however, still in the eddies and swirls of a global financial crisis.

3. The issue it seems to me revolves around profitability and the needs for companies and employees (at all levels) to work through a crisis not of this countries making.

Some forum members seem to believe that since their finacial arrangements could be
negotiated through individual terms and conditions that this approach should be applied
universally. This is a shockingly narrow minded and typically conservative(with a small c) view of labour relations.

Your work conditions are defined by the global flux of the dollar, since it is the dollar
that is the currency of global reserve. If there i sno money to pay you, you dont have
ajob. Indeed many large multi nationals have specialised departments solely for investing
their profits in the finacial markets. This is why the view that capitalism commodifies us
as beings can be stated, for the businesses dont even bother to pay dividends to their own shareholders.

Remember, this current financial crisis has been created by 30 years of increasingly low profitability. Thats is to say, the return on capital ( as teh finacial times called it) has
been falling to such an extent that what would take 5 years to see a doubling of investment, now takes 20 years. (source=financial times)

That is the capitalism that many of the forum members seem to be arguing for. Incredible.
I'm guessing that I'm in a minority on the forum in having read Marx so forgive me little
detour in to marxist theory. Marx said that a decline in the return on capital ( he called it rate of profit)is central to the crisis of capitalism. He suggested that to reverse the decline there needs to be a "annihilation of a great part of the capital". What a terrifying word, annihilation. That cyclistas not only means annihilation of monetary assets, its means annihilation of you.

Not only can assets be discarded and re-bought but so can individuals. This means depressed wages, unemployment and the inevitable social decay and need for scapegoats.

If you were a true marxist you would recognise that this must be the inevitability of history, and as an inevitable hapening, theres no need to debate...
Unless you're a leninist and believe that there is a need for the revolutionary elite to lead the workers on their rebellion (which to me is the ultimate expression of arrogant elitism).

Sure Marx talked about lots of things, but he didn't talk about universal suffrage, universal education, the extension of the meritocracy, and many other measures introduced since.

He was an arrogant post-grad, who found Hegelian ideas inadequete, so teamed up with his inferior to write a long winded critique of others. It was only later he managed to come up with his own stuff, and even then drew heavily on Hegel.

"The German Ideology", his ideological basis of his theory, which was essentially that History tells us what has happened so far. History shows a clear progression, look at the various epochs, and the change in "production intercourse" over time, that shows us what the future is. His History was rubbish, (religion was never a motivator of anyone, yeah right- the Historiography at the time painted the Crusades as a religious war, driven by religious ends, so his deliberate ommitance of that shows an intent to mislead to suit theory).

The idea of clearly defined epochs, and grand narrative has long since gone out of vogue, and his evidence was terrible.
I would rip apart his other works but I find them so offensively arrogant I'd rather not.

(Arrogant in that he is the only man in History to have recognised the truth. The inevitability of History can now happen, because he has perceived the course of events. He awoke the workers of the world through his own unique perception, breaking all of the laws of 'moulded by circumstance' that he set. Perhaps divinely inspired? :twisted: )

And before you criticise, have you read Adam Smith?
Milton Friedmans "monetary history of the United States"?
Any key "capitalist" thinkers?

nolf

I also find it difficult to believe that the return on capital today (well perhaps in the last 3 years, but in 2007 say?), is inferior to that of 30 years ago.
The financial crisis was driven by overleveraged investment, with too small a margin for error. Capital is invested far more efficiently today than ever before, especially in financial markets. A drive to making capital work hard is one of the reasons for the growth in specialism outsourcing through consultancies.

Anyway less of a return on capital has little significance, unless it drops to 0. But as long as people keep buying stuff, and other people keep having clever and sellable ideas that they turn into products/services, that won't be the case.

Cleat Eastwood

I would wholly agree that Marx can an dpossibly should be dismissed as a no more than a privileged bourgeios sociologist. I would if were not for the fact that, for good or ill, he has given hope and courage to many to face sometimes brutal persecutions, torture and imprisonment. I'm ready to stand corrected but I cannot recall anyone of any political persuasion enduring suffering in teh belief that they will be saved by macroeconomics.

None the less I do accept your criticisms, although I would suggest that your antipathy towards him does seem to be more a criticism of Hegel than of marx and I would argue that you're rather missing what I believe his main gifts are to whit the provision of tools for analysis of,particularly, british class relations.

What I was suggesting was that vested intersts fear such analysis and as such seek to discredit Marxian concepts to the degree that, as is implied in the original post, "communist" can be used as a term of abuse.

Now watch as in teh next sentence I'm about to use neo con as a term of abuse for a guy I've not read; such an easy trap to fall into.


The influence of Marx is far wider than that of smith or the arch neo con Friedman ( I have read wealth of nations but know friedman only by the coverage he received following the resecession in the 80's) and whats intersting is that even in countries that espouse Marx's political philosophy his analysis still holds true.

If it is an historical inevitability doesnt that render capitalism immoral?


My own criticisms of Smith are that he focussed too generally on broad concepts that affected the dominant classes. His famous line about teh butcher selling meat not from any altruism but out of greed, negates the idea of why the butcher needs to sell at all. Marx at least tried to analyse that concept.

Smith saw social action as geared towards economic activity (which was probably true at the time, again ignoring the fact that social actions from other classes at different times for example John Balls alliance and subsequent death with Wat Tyler, actually took place), whereas by the time Marx was writing social action had at least 200 years of history an drigid class structures were a;ready beginning to shake following the industrial revolution.

Although its a popular trend its hard to dismiss Marx, I feel its short sighted, if only because he is one of many sources from which our society has been forged and the issues of social justice, equality, fairness and democracy are ideas that we owe more to people like marx, or indeed any number of philosophers, poets artists than to any economists.

It is intersting that you mention Smith and Marx in the same breath though, given that Smith was effectively laying the ground for desroying feudalism and replacing it with our particulary british imperialist ways, for it is these ways as I'm sure you know that Marx was keen to analyse and refute.

Feudalism to socialism to an unknown third way....mmm...sounds very Hegelian.

I'm not a marxist by the way nor god forbid a leninist. I'm just a guy on bike.


Oh by the way the return of capital does matter if its decline leads to the shedding of assets. return of 50% gives you 2 years before you get profit, return of 5% gives you 20 years...in order to recoup what a return of 50% gives...you shed more staff.....unemployment rises....social decay...more suffering....simples.